Dhaka: Bangladesh will import a total of 4.78 million tons of refined petroleum for 2017 from different countries and international suppliers to meet the country's total requirement of over 5 million tons.

The estimated value of the bulk petroleum was estimated at $1.180 billion, an official document of the Energy Division said.

According to the document, half of the total import will be made through negotiations while the import of remaining half will be done through open bidding process.

Recently, state-owned Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation has concluded talks with 11 international fuel supply firms from nine countries for the import of the 2.3 million tons of fuel. This negotiated import will cost about $590.254 million (equivalent to Tk 4663.01 crore), said the official.

In this case, only three types of fuel-diesel, furnace oil and Jet A-1-will be imported from abroad while octane, petrol and kerosene will be supplied to local market from the state-owned Eastern Refinery Limited (ERL) and other private refineries.

While calculating the import cost at the negotiation, the Energy Division document, obtained by UNB, shows the reference price of refined diesel was quoted at $60.72 per barrel, Jet A-1 at $60.10 per barrel and furnace oil at $293.26 per metric ton. The premium on import of the fuels was also fixed for the January-June 2017 period.

As per the negotiation, the premium for diesel was fixed at $2.3 per barrel, premium for jet A-1 at $3 per barrel and premium for furnace oil at $15.80 per metric ton. 

Energy Division officials said the country does not need to outsource octane, petrol and kerosene from international markets as those are now being produced and supplied by local sources. 

ERL annually produces about 1.13 mt of different petroleum products while data on production of local private refineries is not available. But industry insiders said the supply from local private refineries would not exceed 200,000 mts.

The Cabinet Purchase Committee recently approved a proposal of the Energy Division giving go-ahead to Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) to import the 2.39 million mt petroleum fuels from 11 international firms of 9 countries.

As per the proposal, BPC will import 1.23 million tons of fuel from Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (LKPC), 270,000 mt from PTLCL of Malaysia, 160,000 mt from ENOC of the UAE, 160,000 mt from Petrochina of China, 140,000 mt from PNOC of the Philippines, 140,000 mt from UNIPEC of China, 100,000 mt from Petrolimex of Vietnam, 80,000 mt from Bumi Siak of Indonesia, 30,000 mt from Zhenhua of China, 30,000 mt from PTTT of Thailand and 50,000 mt from OTI of Oman.